Joe is a book showing the underside of rural life among the poor and ignorant in late 20^th century Mississippi. The protagonist Joe is a drunk and aggressive man with few concerns about anyone else besides himself but who has an inherent sense of right and wrong and a basic morality of when you can and cannot cross the line of morality/honor. He befriends a teenager, Gary, who has been abused his whole life by an alcoholic, violent, murderer who is father of Gary and four other children, one killed, one sold, one prostituted, and one runaway. The wife/mother is overwhelmed by violence and intimidated by her husband, so completely ineffectual. Joe realizes over time this abuse and slowly begins to do something about it, by educating Gary in his ways or drinking and whoring but also in allowing him the independence of work, making money, and having his own truck. Teaching him to be a man. In the end Joe sacrifices his own well being and independence and freedom for the sake of teenage Gary and his younger sister.

Throughout the book the author provides a background of the peace and quiet and sameness of nature that contrasts with the activity, violence, and artificial actions of human beings. We see this in the epilogue. The author highlights the savagery of humans throughout the book. For example, of the characters, the only one with any common sense is Gary; his mother is crazy, his sister rebellious and hates her father, his younger sister is overwhelmed and internalizes the aggression imposed upon her, his father is a violence criminal, and Joe is a drunkard.

It is a story about survival: survival of the fittest in the natural environment including human environment of animalistic humans. It is a coming of age story, of a boy who learns about life, becomes a man.

Joe, who has nothing to live for, finally discovers something to live for in Gary. Joe realizes the inherent misfortune of Gary’s life, and he becomes a father figure for Gary.

Other themes: Human relations ultimately insignificant according to the backdrop of natural environment; Inherent evil and misfortune of life, little to live for; just a glimmer of hope in the inherent evil and misfortune of life; ignorance of humans in the rural South at the end of the 20^th century, which leads to suffering and tragedy.

In sum, Joe is all of the above, but mostly it is a book about the overall insignificance of human affairs in the wider reality of nature, which overwhelms humans and often forces them to act like civilized animals, people who have developed machines and artificial substances and ways of doing things to cover, or enhance, the basic animal tendencies that they still have. The epilogue reveals the author’s overall point of view. There is a greatness and grandeur in nature that dwarfs humans. Modernization has elevated humans but at the consequence of irrational beings that have way too much power and cannot achieve the tranquility and inherent contentment of the past. Morality has been dwarfed by people living in the moment seeking some sort of meaning and contentment but not being able to find it, so they turn to artificial substances and machines to make them feel powerful, better. There is a basic sense of morality that you don’t hurt an innocent, that you try to be fair to others, your equals, and if you can’t keep from hurting, can’t be fair, you will be punished by meaninglessness and hopelessness but also by other humans. It appears to be a godless society, but as the epilogue reveals, there is a basic natural truth that exists that humans can understand and admire.